FanHouse Ben Sheets

From the Windup is Matt Snyder's weekly look at some aspect of America's pastime.

Zack Greinke has been the best pitcher in the majors this season.

That statement wouldn't be disputed by anyone other than people who look only at won-loss record and nothing more. I'm not suggesting you throw that stat out the window, but you can take Greinke's 15-8 record, combine it with everything else, and still come to the conclusion that the best pitcher in 2009 plays for the Kansas City Royals.

With that in mind, I wanted to create a starting rotation from the past decade of pitchers who were similarly plagued by a less-than-stellar record, while also sporting filthy numbers elsewhere. It's the Zack Greinke Tribute Team.

Don't get nervous, Brewers fans, Ryan Braun isn't asking out of Milwaukee. Quite the opposite, actually. He's asking that general manager Doug Melvin try to pull off something like he did a year ago Tuesday when the Brewers landed CC Sabathia in a deal that helped propel them to the postseason for the first time since 1982.

The timing of Braun's request is understandable. The Brewers just dropped three of four games at Wrigley Field to the recently revived Cubs, and two of those games featured poor starts from Mike Burns and Seth McClung. Those aren't names you'll find starting games for too many playoff teams, something Braun would like the Brewers to be this season.

From the Windup is Matt Snyder's extended look at some aspect of America's pastime each Thursday.

With the recent news that Mark DeRosa is on the trade block and the White Sox have possibly landed Jake Peavy, junkies of major league baseball trade rumors got an early glimpse at what promises to be a very interesting July. It's far to0 early to know exactly who will be in the market for what -- or who can afford to take on temporary payroll in this economy -- but it's certainly fun to speculate. Let's do it.

At one point last winter, it seemed like Ben Sheets was going to be one of the most sought after free agents of the 2008/2009 offseason. Questions over the health of his elbow lingered, though, and he remained unsigned well into January. He nearly signed a deal with the Rangers then, but a physical showed that he needed elbow surgery and that deal fell through.

Now we're halfway through May and Sheets still doesn't have a team, though T.R. Sullivan, the beat writer at Rangers.com, reported yesterday that Sheets was at Rangers' Ballpark in Arlington before last night's game. Apparently, Sheets is going to see James Andrews next week and hopes to get clearance to start throwing again in hopes of returning for the end of the 2009 season.

Ken Macha is doing it again.

The manager who has never had a losing season -- not as a minor league manager, major league coach or major league manager -- has the Brewers playing some of the best baseball in the big leagues.

As they head into this weekend's series with the Cardinals, who are tied with the Brewers for first in the NL Central, the Brewers have won 18 of their last 24.

While Macha would be the first to tell you that the players are more responsible for winning than the manager, this team has Macha's fingerprints all over it.

NEW YORK – Basic math: subtract two pitchers who went 24-11, another who saved 28 games and two managers and what do you get?

Well, besides a boost in attendance, the Brewers say they can be even better in 2009 than last year, when they went to the playoffs for the first time since 1982.

"I think we can [be as good]," veteran infielder Craig Counsell told FanHouse last week. "We have an offense that really should be better than last year – young guys in the prime of their careers."

That's right, MLB Power Rankings. You do know that that means, right? It means we're only a few short weeks/months (depends on you how you want to look at it, you pessimistic jerk) from starting the 2009 baseball season. Spring is nearly here, everyone has a bounce in their step and there's not an illegal, injectable steroid in sight!

So without further ado, let's get down to business and rank every single Major League Baseball team right freaking now. Because baseball can't wait any longer to get going.

I guess we can put the speculation to bed once and for all now, because Ken Rosenthal is reporting that Ben Sheets did in fact undergo elbow surgery earlier this week to repair the partially torn flexor-tendon in his right elbow. It sounds like it was a successful surgery, but that's not going to make the contract offers come pouring back in for Sheets.

As it stands right now, he's going to miss a significant portion of the season, and it sounds like he's targeting a return for sometime around the trade deadline. I'm not sure how likely that is, but it's possible some team will sign him and take a chance on his rehab year for the assurance that they get a (presumably) healthier Sheets for the next couple years down the road.

UPDATE: According to SI.com's Jon Heyman, Sheets will undergo surgery on the flexor tendon tear in his right elbow with an eye toward returning to the mound in the second half of 2009.

Wednesday was a weird day of news surrounding Ben Sheets. Around noon, our own Matt Snyder e-mailed our group asking if we knew why Sportsline was listing Sheets as injured to start the season. We looked around and none of us knew, so we assumed it was a typo. Later that night, a Rangers beat writer wrote up a cryptic blog post about Sheets, seemingly hinting he was injured.

For the last couple of weeks, it's sort of seemed like a foregone conclusion that Ben Sheets would head to the Texas Rangers. The Rangers can use another arm and with Mike Maddux, his old pitching coach in Milwaukee, in Arlington, it all seemed like a good fit. And so, of course, TR Sullivan, the Rangers' MLB.com beat writer, is writing tonight that he doesn't think Sheets will end up in Texas.

Sullivan's post is on his blog and it's entirely speculative, so it's hard to say whether he's got some real information or it's just a gut feeling like he says it is. It certainly seems to me that reports from MLB.com are unreliable, but pointing out that they messed up the Jason Bay trade at the deadline last year ignores that other sources have whiffed on things like the Jermaine Dye and Jack Wilson trades that never happened. Still, Sullivan wrote this in a blog post, not an article on Rangers.com, so it truly is hard to say how much there is to this.